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JANUARY, 2000
·IN THE WORKS·
a report from the Environmental Working Group of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting
Dear Friends: PLEASE HELP PUBLICIZE EWG's ACTIVITIES in your meeting. We send our mailing to at least two people in each meeting. If there is someone other than yourself who we should mail to, please let us know.
FRIENDS UNITED MEETING approved a minute on Care for God's Creation at its 1999 Triennial Session in Williamsburg Virginia. The occasion for the minute is described in the June 1999 issue of Quaker Life. Visit FUM's website at www.fum.org.
An "OPEN MEETING" on RENEWABLE ENERGY will be held from 9:45 AM to 12,15 PM on Saturday, March 11, at the Arch Street Meeting House. The presenter will be James MacKenzie, Senior Associate with the World Resources Institute, who works with the Institute's Climate Protection Initiative and has written WRI publications on climate, energy, and transportation. Registration will begin at 9:30. There will be two interactive sessions with a break for refreshments between them.
This year's Earth Day theme, which is on the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter, is a call for action on climate change and making a transition to renewable sources of energy. The program with Jim MacKenzie will explore the prospects and obstacles, both technical and political, for the Earth Day theme. Please post the enclosed announcement!
THE PA INTERFAITH CAMPAIGN ON GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
An interfaith campaign on global climate change is under way led by the PA Council of Churches in collaboration with the National Council of Churches (NCC) and the National Religious Partnership for the Environment. Its purposes are to educate PA's faith communities about
- global warming as a religious issue of protecting God's earth and people,
- the need for strong international agreements and national policies to slow global warming,
- opportunities to reduce energy use and to buy electricity from less damaging sources.
WAYS YOU CAN HELP!
- Find out about buying Green-e certified electricity. ( Maybe you aready have! ) For products in your service territory, check Internet or in PA call Penn Future at 800/321-7775. In NJ call Ed Dreby at 609/261-8190.
- Tell others in your Meeting what you've learned about buying Green-e electricity. Ask the Meeting Property Committee to find out about buying Green-e electricity, and about NCC's Energy Stewardship program.
- Come to the "open meeting" on Renewable Energy, Sat, March 11 at 9:45 am, AND BRING A FRIEND from a different faith.
- Arrange for an adult discussion on global warming at your meeting.
- Help arrange a presentation on the PA or NJ interfaith global warming campaign at your communty's interfaith council or clergy association.
When will we ever learn? The main purpose of electric restructuring is to lower energy costs. This comes at a time when we in the United States need to help slow global warming by making substantial reductions in our energy use and shifting to renewable sources. Lower costs usually do not result in reduced consumption.
Yet electric restructuring does offer an opportunity. We can buy renewable electricity, even though it may cost more. And by reducing the amount of electricity we use we can do this without increasing our electric bill.
Most Meetings are commercial customers. Comparing different products and their costs for commercial accounts is more complicated than for residential customers. Barabara Atkinson, a member of the Bryn Gwellyd community, helped Southampton Monthly Meeting assess the pros and cons of different products. She is willing to help other monthly meetings in the PECO service territory do this as well. Barbara can be reached at 2151942-0184.
Your Meeting can participate in the NCC Energy Stewardship program by calling 800/288-1346 and get help with reducing energy use. If your Meeting has already taken steps to reduce energy use, the Energy Stewardship program especially wants to know in order to learn what your experience has been.
The PA campaign began with a conference in Lebanon PA in September. Next steps will be conferences and/or workshops in four regions of the state beginning this spring: western, central southern, central north and eastern, and southeastern. EWG will inform monthly meetings in the regions when the regional events are scheduled.
Several EWG members and associates have participated in NCC conferences and/or workshops on global climate change. We welcome invitatins to visit meetings or committees to discuss the concern for global climate change as a religious issue and to provide information about the Energy Stewardship program and about buying Green-e electricity.
To arrange an adult discussion on global warming or a visit with a committee on electric restructuring, contact Ed Dreby or Margaret Mansfield (609/261-8190), Stephen Greene (610/358-1555), Rob Grow (609/953-5349), or Hollister Knowlton (215/247-0718).
EWG members can also lead discussions and workshops on these other topics:
- Clarifying Eco-Perspectives
- Our Ecological Footprint"
- Indians and Oil in the Amazon
- Trees as Metaphors
- The Rapanui: An Ecological and Spiritual Metaphor
Subscribe to EWG's Quaker Eco-Bulletin. Send an e-mail message with a subject of "request eco-bulletin" to kathy-sigk2nesoft.com. Distributed approximately once a month by e-mail, QEB provides Friends with timely information on national policy issues relating to ecological sustainability from a faith based perspective, much as the FCNL Washington Newsletter does for issues of peace and social justice.
EWG now has a web page on PYM's website at www.pym.org. We are grateful to Phil Jones of Chestnut Hill Meeting who is our inaugural webmaster.
The Environmental Working Group meets every first Tuesday at Friends Center. Any PYM member or attender is welcome. To attend a meeting , for questions and suggestions, or EWG materials, contact Ed Dreby, project leader, 60,9/261-8190 or drebymansc@igc.org.